Ethyl Petroleum Additives told Naamsa last week to “stop spreading misinformation” about its product, MMT. Now Ethyl has criticised what it calls the association’s attempts to backtrack from its claims.
Ethyl Petroleum Additives told Naamsa last week to “stop spreading misinformation” about its product, MMT. Now Ethyl has criticised what it calls the association’s attempts to backtrack from its claims.
John Aitken, business director of Ethyl Petroleum Additives, last week said that the misinformation being spread by Naamsa deliberately misled the government and caused substantial damage to MMT, Ethyl Petroleum Additives and the company’s oil industry customers.
The attempts by Naamsa to backtrack from claims that vehicles were being damaged by petrol additive MMT were insufficient and unacceptable, according to the MMT manufacturer, and added that ethically Naamsa should admit that it made a mistake and acknowledge that MMT does not cause damage to vehicles.
“What is going on at the moment is truly shocking. Naamsa, in its commercial support of an individual oil company’s marketing campaign (BP Southern Africa, as CARtoday.com reported recently) coldly and deliberately issued a report to do damage to the vast majority of SA’s unleaded fuel.
“It contains claims and allegations about our product that are simply untrue – and they are highly damaging in an environment where the South African Government is currently re-considering its fuels policy including the use of MMT.
“In the face of all the evidence to the contrary, Naamsa are still trying to say that MMT causes damage. Our copy of the report cites evidence of 20 catalytic converters that they claim were damaged by MMT. Yet we have photographs, that we are happy to release to the media, of more than 100 damaged catalytic converters collected in just two months in Durban – where there is no MMT in the fuel,” Aitken added.
Last week CARtoday.com reported that Aitken stated that the claims made by Naamsa regarding the damage that MMT caused to catalytic converters “are unsubstantiated and not true. The auto industry around the world has failed for many years to produce any data which can stand up to rigorous scientific evaluation, to support allegations that MMT is detrimental to vehicles.”
Naamsa has said the an internal/confidential memorandum had been used by the association as the basis of engaging various oil companies on the subject on a variety of fuel quality and vehicle performance related issues.
“Based on reports by various automotive companies marketing catalytic converter vehicles with sophisticated emission control equipment, there have been some instances of catalytic converter blockages attributed to the use of the metal additive unleaded petrol,” a Naamsa spokesman said recently.
“Typically, these instances have occurred on vehicles which have exceeded 60 000 km. Where a problem has manifested itself, the matter has been rectified by the vehicle manufacturer in terms of the company’s warranty policy. Catalytic converter vehicles throughout South Africa as a proportion of the total car population is at present less than 10 per cent.”
Naamsa, however, remained concerned about the influence of heavy metals in unleaded petrol on the performance of high technology, catalytic converter vehicles and will “continue to engage the oil industry on fuel quality issues in an effort to ensure that unleaded petrol marketed in South Africa meets the needs of motorists and vehicle manufacturers”.